Lost in Suburbia: Don’t call me ... I’ll call you

Wednesday

“Hello, Hello,” I said, picking up the phone when I saw my husband’s number come up on my caller ID.

Nothing.

“Hellllloooooooooo?” I said louder.

“Can I have a Tall, Decaf, Skim Mocha Frapppucino,” I heard my husband say. It sounded like he wasn’t talking directly into his phone, but rather from a galaxy far, far away.

“HELLLLOOOOOO!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. “HONEY, YOUR PHONE IS CALLING ME AGAIN!!”

This, unfortunately, was not a new scenario. There are times when my husband calls me on his cell phone, and then there are times when his cell phone calls me all on its own. My husband keeps his phone in his rear pocket and sometimes he will use his phone and then slip it into his pocket and he will sit on it and it will call me. The problem is, while his phone knows it called me, my husband doesn’t.

“PICK UP YOUR PHONE!” I yelled again. “PICK. IT. UP!”

I imagined people waiting in line behind him wondering why there was a tiny voice coming from my husband’s butt.

I waited, but alas, nothing happened. He didn’t hear me. No one heard me. This must be what’s it like to be a Who in Whoville.

I hung up, then, I picked up the phone again. Because he didn’t hang up on his end, we were still connected. Now I couldn’t use my phone until his phone decided to hang up. I was trapped in cell phone purgatory.

“Your phone called me again today,” I told him in a huff later that night.

He laughed. “Come on. It did not.”

“You went to Starbucks today and got a Grandé Decaf Skim Mocha Frappucino,” I said.He paused. “You’re wrong! It was a Tall. I knew you made this up.”

“I DIDN’T MAKE IT UP!!! I KNOW WHAT YOU DID AND I KNOW WHERE YOU WERE BECAUSE YOUR STUPID PHONE CALLED ME!!!!” I yelled. I couldn’t help it. I was at the end of my rope. His phone was calling me three or four times a day. I was being harassed by a rogue cellphone.

“I think you’re over-reacting,” he said in the calm, soothing tone people use to talk to their mothers and other irrational people.

“Please put the phone in your front pocket or something because it’s driving me nuts,” I pleaded. Clearly he didn’t understand how much this was bothering me. I thought, maybe I should take matters into my own hands. Yes, I suppose the phone could “accidentally” end up in the wash. Or in the garbage disposal. Or under the wheel of my car. Even for me, psycho-housewife, that all seemed a little extreme. Well, maybe not the wash.I realized the only way to deal with this was to change tactics.

“You know, maybe this isn’t a bad thing,” I told him. “This phone can help me keep track of you when you’re not around. Every time you sit down and your phone calls me, I can hear where you are and what you’re doing,” I said thoughtfully.

He frowned. I could hear the wheels turning. “Well, I don’t want it to keep interrupting your day,” he said. “Maybe I’ll find another place to keep the phone.”

“Great.” I replied. Victory was mine.

The next day, my husband didn’t accidentally call me once. But then my phone rang and I saw my brother’s number come up on the screen.

“Hello?”

I heard my brother in the background, a bit muffled. “Turkey on rye with mustard, please.”

— For more Lost in Suburbia, follow Tracy on Facebook at facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage or on Twitter at @TracyBeckerman.

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